Latest Stories
Most recently published stories in Families.
Divorce, from a Child's Perspective
The divorce rate in the United States is 40$-50%. Adults and children alike are affected by this separation. Some marriages end before children are brought into the mix, which possibly makes the separation easier. Nothing about divorce is necessarily easy, if abuse was involved there is trauma and healing to go through, if it was amicable, you're still likely to be left to deal with the loss of that connection. Once children come into the mix the effects are no longer just impacting the adults. There are both long-term and short-term effects of divorce.
By Shasta Scott5 years ago in Families
Having a baby in 2020
As 2020 ended I thought to myself, “what a bizarre year”. What a bizarre year to be pregnant and have a baby in the same year. 2020 was rough. Rough for everyone. Some a little more rough than others. For me it was extremely rough. I got pregnant and had a baby writhing the same year. 2020. My husband and I had been trying since October, 2019, so we didn’t intend to get pregnant a month before the big shut down. We had been trying 5 months prior, but I guess God has a funny way of making things work out.
By Yvonne Meeuse5 years ago in Families
Post #3 - In the early 70s this Big Old House became my home
Sotomayor 593 It couldn’t have been a worse time to attempt a reconciliation with Tatita and Nona. Chile had just recently fallen under a dictatorship, which made it rather difficult for anyone to move freely within Santiago.
By The Venus Quest5 years ago in Families
Always Loved
Tear drops drip, drip, drip down my cheeks onto the pillow. Lower lip is bitten in attempt to muffle the scream waiting to escape from the mouth. The bed is pounded by the fist repeatedly in an effort to let out some of the pent up frustration and rage. Continuous flashbacks play over and over in the brain, never letting things settle down for even a moment. What’s going on? This is grief, at least from my perspective.
By Rebecca Loretta Arbic5 years ago in Families
The Bad Little Brothers
“Run!!” he cried out. Both boys threw open the door to their house and fled on foot down the street into the evening fog. Behind them, they could see the light shining through the front door as the silhouette of a maddening creature roared violently into the blackening sky.
By C. Taylor Eason5 years ago in Families
FOR REASONS BEYOND CONTROL
I thought at first when I was small. Those adults always seemed to speak loudly and because they were taller, they appeared larger than life, intimidating, vicious and relentless. I soon realized calling them that was giving them too much credit. Their boisterous and overbearing attitude is a way to conceal cowardice. When confronted, they scare easily and like rats scurrying back into the gutters. They do not deserve being held in such high esteem, because such attribute is far beyond their limited capabilities and will power, something they could never achieve and do not even know exists. They remain indifferent; weaklings who excuse their narrow-mindedness with words of serenity and logic to explain the inability for wanting more and expecting more. Conformism is always excused as the will of a god and hardships are always caused by the government. They deceive themselves into believing in a reward afterwards, peace and contentment that will be placed at their feet by some deity, something that they know it is not true. Otherwise, they would be happy and always content with the crumbs they possess and must survive with. They know deep in their hearts they are barely surviving and rejoicing for nothing, only enjoying brief moments of glee that soon are overshadowed by a harsh reality of needing and wanting. They feel oppressed by those small abodes they occupy, continuing to add inhabitants because they cannot control themselves and see their already small portions being reduced by yet another mouth. They cannot breathe; too many lungs seek the precious oxygen from a space already crowded. Movement is hindered by overcrowding. They cannot stretch, condemned to a packed space where they cannot express what they feel, for voicing such words would take away the space they detest but cannot escape. They cannot say what they feel, and if they think it, they do not reveal it, for such utterances may cause great grief. Religion is used as an excuse for remaining in an unsatisfactory status quo — the foundation for all religions, otherwise how could nature maintain its evolutionary perfection?
By Pedro A. Idarraga5 years ago in Families
THE MASK
Once upon a time in the small town of Normal, Illinois, lived a girl named Ndim. She was American, but her father was from an African country called Cameroon. That is why her name did not sound America. Her mother was American. When Ndim was three years old, her parents told her stories about witchcraft and sorcerers in African countries. She was scared about these stories because she did not like witchcraft or sorcerers.
By Sandra Bongjoh5 years ago in Families
Brighter Days
It is midnight on a Tuesday and my sister and I are getting pulled from our beds by our mother to run off to a hotel, or what I called apartments at the time. This was normal for our family about once a month, when my dad would lose control and back my mom into a corner unleashing on her things that should never be unleashed. My sister and I would share a hotel bed and get up and go to school the next day as if nothing happened. Honestly, as much of a disruption this was I felt more at peace on those nights then when I was home in my own bed because the endless fighting would keep me awake. Shattering glass on the wall, the yelling and hateful words spewed from my parents mouths. School was my safe haven, school was a sanctuary and a safe place. Population 1,600, graduating class size 46 a place where you knew every person and they knew everything about you or at least what you wanted them to know.
By Tara Horvath5 years ago in Families
Birth and Rebirth
It is May 31st, 2020 and I am watching the news at 6pm with my partner. I’m only half watching as the latest numbers dead from the virus is announced. My mind is preoccupied, constantly, as it has been for forty weeks. As I look down at my pregnant belly, immense and ripe enough to drop like an apple, emotions come filtering down through my mind. Like dappled autumn light they hover, each thought distinguished from the others yet none have any strength. Fear. It’s there, ominous and clever. Fear of giving birth of course. But another, the fear of being a mother. I can not honestly say I love my baby yet. I don’t know how I feel at all, except perhaps there is a sense of detachment for now. Doubt. I doubt very much that I’ll be a good mother. I lost my own mother at eight years old. Her cancer ripped my world apart and my childhood fled before my eyes and in its place crouched a dark new being composed of loss and wilderness. I do not know how to be a mother. How do I hold this baby, his entire world in my hands and guide him through this terrifying world so that he is not alone? Hope. I think I see it, further off, a faint star. Is there always hope? I hope that labor will not kill me, that the baby, my baby, will be well and that I will love him. He kicks inside me and I feel the thrill of the unknown, always accompanied by the oppressive weight of doubt and fear. My belly ripples and moves as he stretches out inside me and I look with wonder at what my body has accomplished. He is late, by three days. Does this mean he’ll get too big and I’ll have more pain? Is he ok in there? I am so afraid. His birth has felt like an eternity in the making and somehow it still feels like it will never happen. The imminence and unavoidable truth of it is almost surreal.
By Freda Ellis5 years ago in Families
Grandmothers And Coffee Are Heaven Sent Blessings.
Recently it was brought to my attention how absolutely fucking PRECIOUS grandmothers and coffee are. Conveniently enough I was in a coffee shop sitting with a delicious brew, while my daughter munched down her sushi and lemonade next to me, when this epiphany came to me.
By Hannah Pitchers5 years ago in Families
Grandma's House
She stepped into the house for the first time since her grandmother had passed. She breathed in the familiar scent: mothballs with a hint of those peppermint LifeSavers her grandmother couldn’t be caught without. She had been in this house countless times over the years, but she realized she always took the same path: through the side door, across the kitchen, and into the living room where she sat on the couch and read the Ten Commandments out loud, while her grandmother sat nodding along in her chair. This house, built in the late 1800s, was full of relics she had never stopped to appreciate. Now, taking stock of the things around her, she was sure her grandmother would have had captivating stories to tell about why she had so many pig figurines, or who the people were in the painting done by her grandfather that hung in the dining room. She walked around room to room, surveying each one’s contents, and figuring out where to start clearing out first. She paused at the door to the basement, giving it a hard tug—the wood often swelled in the humidity and was difficult to open. Making her way down the steps, she remembered the story her dad used to tell her about the Boogey Man who lived in the crawl space down there. She was older now, and she knew there was no Boogey Man, which was why she laughed to herself when she felt a nostalgic twinge of fear as she passed the crawlspace door. She waved her arm in the air, searching for the string that would illuminate the one dim bulb that hung in the center of the room. She wasn’t afraid of the dark, but she also didn’t like being in the 200-year-old basement of her dead grandmother without any light. Finally, her fingers closed around the frayed end. She let out a shriek as the dusty bulb flickered on and shed light on a skeleton propped up on the old workbench next to her. She bent over with her hands on her knees and let her heavy breathing morph into a laugh as she recalled the haunted house they had set up down there for the neighborhood the previous year. She made a mental note to make sure she got rid of it—the realtor probably wouldn’t find it as funny.
By Chris Walden 5 years ago in Families
